[71]
The rhetoricians
have however been nearer the truth in their censure
of certain other faults that may occur in the exordium.
The stock exordium which can be suited to a number
of different cases they style vulgar; it is an unpopular
form but can sometimes be effectively employed and
has often been adopted by some of the greatest orators.
The exordium which might equally well be used by
our opponent, they style common. That which our
opponent can turn to his own advantage, they call
interchangeable, that which is irrelevant to the case,
detached, and that which is drawn from some other
speech, transferred. In addition to these they
censure others as long and others as contrary to rule.
Most of these faults are however not peculiar to the
exordinum, but may be found in any or every portion
of a speech.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1921.
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